Empiricism
PHIL3072, Advanced Analytic Philosophy, ANU, 2015
I know most of the links below are dead. I can resurrect them if anyone needs them. Probably.
For official information, see the course outline: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/course-outline.pdf and the Wattle site: http://wattlecourses.anu.edu.au/course/view.php?id=14200.
Essay 1 topics and rules are now available at http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/essay-topics-1.pdf. The deadline for submitting essay 1 is 5 pm on the 9th of September.
This web site is for:
additional readings — see below
the course outline (including rules and assessment details): http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/course-outline.pdf
lecture notes (in case anyone misses a class or loses the notes I’m handing out): http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/lecture-notes
a discussion board if anyone wants one.
The class representative for this course is Liam Ryan: u4845549@anu.edu.au. You can contact him if you’d like to convey your opinions about the course to the School of Philosophy (or you can talk to me, or you can talk to the head of the teaching program, Bronwyn Finnigan, or to the head of the School, Christian Barry, or you can give your opinions on the survey we’ll have at the end of semester).
General Reading
The online Stanford Enyclopedia of Philosophy: http://plato.stanford.edu It’s worth reading the Stanford Enyclopedia entries for all the philosophers we study.
Simon Blackburn — ‘Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy’ (cheap paperback; any edition is fine; or the ANU library has it online although in a weird format)
Bertrand Russell — ‘History of Western Philosophy’ (any edition): http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Russell%20-%20History%20of%20Western%20Philosophy.pdf — particularly good on the connections between philosophers.
Early Modern Empiricism
Required Reading
Galileo Galilei — ‘The Assayer’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Galileo.pdf
John Locke — ‘An Essay Concerning Human Understanding’ Book 2, chapter 8: http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/locke/locke1/Book2a.html#Chapter%20VIII
John Locke — ‘An Essay Concerning Human Understanding’ Book 4, chapters 1-3: http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/locke/locke1/Book4a.html#Chapter%20I
John Locke — ‘An Essay Concerning Human Understanding’ Book 4, chapter 9: http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/locke/locke1/Book4b.html#Chapter%20IX
George Berkeley — ‘A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge’ (Part 1, sections 1, 3, 4, 8, 9, 18, 19): http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Berkeley%20-%20Commonplace%20Book%20-%20An%20Essay%20Towards%20A%20New%20Theory%20of%20Vision%20-%20A%20Treating%20Concerning%20the%20Principles%20Of%20Human%20Knowledge%20-%20Three%20Dialogues%20Between%20Hylas%20and%20And%20Philonous%20-%20De%20Motu.pdf (a good edition but with a bunch of extraneous stuff), or http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Berkeley%20-%20The%20Principles%20of%20Human%20Knowledge%20etc..pdf
David Hume — ‘A Treatise of Human Nature’ volume 1 part 1 sections 1-3 volume 1 part 2 section 6 volume 1 part 3 section 2 volume 1 part 3 sections 6-10 & volume 1 part 3 sections 14-16: http://www.davidhume.org/texts/thn.html (you can use the weird red box in the top right of that page to navigate to the sections you need) or https://www.gutenberg.org/files/4705/4705-h/4705-h.htm
Additional Reading
- John Locke — ‘An Essay Concerning Human Understanding’ Book 1 chapter 1, Book 2 chapter 2: http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/locke/locke1/Book1a.html
Logical Positivism
Required Reading
Bertrand Russell — ‘The Relation of Sense-Data to Physics’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Russell%20-%20RelationSenseData.pdf
Ian Hacking — ‘Positivism’ from Representing and Intervening: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Hacking%20-%20Positivism.pdf
Karl Popper — ‘A note on Berkeley as a precursor to Mach and Einstein’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Popper.pdf
A. J. Ayer — ‘Language, Truth and Logic’, Preface and Chapter 4: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Ayer%20-%20LanguageTruthAndLogic.pdf
Additional Reading
Bertrand Russell — ‘The Philosophy of Logical Atomism’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Russell%20-%20The%20Philosophy%20of%20Logical%20Atomism.pdf
Anthony O’Hear — ‘Scientific Realism’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/O%e2%80%99Hear%20-%20Scientific%20Realism.pdf
Michael Friedman — ‘Carnap’s Aufbau Reconsidered’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Friedman%20-%20Carnap%27s%20Aufbau%20Reconsidered.pdf
Albert Einstein — ‘Remarks on Bertrand Russell’s Theory of Knowledge’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Einstein%20-%20Remarks%20on%20Bertrand%20Russell%E2%80%99s%20Theory%20of%20Knowledge.pdf
Carl Hempel — ‘Problems and Changes in the Empirical Criterion of Meaning’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Hempel.pdf
Otto Neurath — ‘Protocol Sentences’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Neurath.pdf
Moritz Schlick — ‘The Foundation of Knowledge’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Schlick.pdf
Ernst Mach — ‘The Economy of Science’ from ‘The Science of Mechanics’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Mach%20-%20The%20Economy%20of%20Science.pdf
C. I. Lewis — ‘The Given Content of Empirical Knowledge’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/CILewis.pdf
Quine and Carnap
Required Reading
W. v. O. Quine — ‘Two Dogmas of Empiricism’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Quine%20-%20Two%20Dogmas.pdf or http://www.ditext.com/quine/quine.html
Rudolph Carnap — ‘Empiricism, Semantics and Ontology’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/CarnapESO.pdf
Additional Reading
H. P. Grice and P. F. Strawson — ‘In Defense of a Dogma’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Grice%20and%20Strawson.pdf
W. v. O. Quine — ‘Posits and Reality’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Quine%20-%20Posits.pdf
W. v. O. Quine — ‘On What There Is’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Quine%20-%20On%20What%20There%20Is.pdf
Theory and Observation in Science
Required Reading
- Norwood Russell Hanson — sections from Patterns of Discovery: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Hanson.pdf
Additional Reading
- Grover Maxwell — ‘The Ontological Status of Theoretical Entities’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Maxwell.pdf
Post-Positivist Challenges
Required Reading
Arthur Fine — “The Natural Ontological Attitude”: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Fine%20-%20The%20Natural%20Ontological%20Attitude%20-%20The-Shaky-Game-second-edition.pdf
Arthur Fine — “And Not Antirealism Either”: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Fine%20-%20And%20Not%20Antirealism%20Either%20-%20The-Shaky-Game-second-edition.pdf
Additional Reading
Huw Price — ‘Metaphysics after Carnap — The Ghost who Walks’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Price%20-%20Metaphysics%20After%20Carnap%20-%20the%20Ghost%20Who%20Walks%3f.pdf
Stephen Yablo — ‘Does Ontology Rest on a Mistake?’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Yablo%20-%20Does%20Ontology%20Rest%20on%20a%20Mistake%3f.pdf
Huw Price — ‘Quining Naturalism’ http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Price%20-%20QuiningNaturalism.pdf
Donald Davidson — ‘A Coherence Theory of Knowledge’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Davidson%20-%20A_Coherence_Theory_of_Truth_and_Knowledge.pdf
Donald Davidson — ‘Empirical Content’: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Davidson%20-%20Empirical_Content.pdf
Wilfrid Sellars — sections from Empiricism and Philosophy of Mind: http://mary.xeny.net/empiricism/Sellars%20-%20EmpPhilMind.pdf
And finally, In Praise of Idleness, by Bertrand Russell: http://xeny.net/InPraiseOfIdleness
xeny.net